baptism

Go:901 Love Shows (Rom. 5:8) Chris Altrock – Sept. 11, 2016

by chrisaltrock
September 13, 2016

Go 901 title for chris website

I Agree

If you’ve ever bought a new app for your phone or updated software on our iPad or on your computer, or if you’ve ever signed up for a new loyalty card online, you’ve seen a lengthy legal terms of service agreement. Before you could proceed with the software update or the purchase of the loyalty card, you had to indicate that you read that statement and click the button that said “agree.”

Raise your hand if you’ve ever read it before you clicked the button that said “agree.”

Jonathan Obar at York University says that it would take the average person 40 minutes a day, every day, for a year to fully read all of these legal service agreement statements which we encounter. Thus, most of us never read them. We just click, “Agree.”

To test this, Obar and a colleague conducted an experiment where they tried to get people to sign up for a new social network site called “Name Drop.” When people signed up, there was a typical service agreement that popped up on the computer screen. The user had to click “agree” in order to use the service. Buried in the agreement were two disclosures. Read More »Go:901 Love Shows (Rom. 5:8) Chris Altrock – Sept. 11, 2016

The (re)Born Identity of Service: Remembering Who You’ve Become Through Baptism (1 Cor. 12:1-20)

by chrisaltrock
August 19, 2009

I read recently of an orchestra where the violinists have started a court case. They are suing the orchestra because they want to be paid more money for playing their violins. The violin players claim that they deserve to be paid more than any of the other musicians in the orchestra. Why? They point to how many notes they play per concert. Those playing the flute, oboe, or trombone, claim the violinists, play far fewer notes than the very busy violinists. And since the violinists play more notes per concert, they want more pay. It’s an intriguing example of the way in which we often devalue others’ service. These violinists seemed to overvalue their own service and undervalue the service of others. They didn’t seem to appreciate the contribution the other musicians were making to the orchestra. And, often we do the same thing. Sometimes we even do this in church.

The (re)Born Identity of Status: Remembering Who You’ve Become Through Baptism (1 Cor. 1:10-17)

by chrisaltrock
August 19, 2009

In his book Searching for God Knows What, Donald Miller describes his search for an identity as an atheist who had just graduated from high school: [1] I’ve always been the kind of guy who likes to be seen as smart. It’s not as bad as it sounds because I don’t go around saying all kinds of smart-guy stuff to make other people feel like jerks or anything; it’s just that I was never very good at much of anything else. You know, like I would try basketball for a while, and when I was a kid I played soccer and tennis, but I was never very good at any of that. And then I learned to play the guitar, but got very bored because what I really wanted was to be a rock star, not to actually play the guitar. So about the time I told God he didn’t exist, I was desperate for an identity. While this was taking place in my life, I happened to attend a lecture by the chairman of the American Debate Team, who was about 25 or so, and there were a lot of girls in the audience because he was very rich and good-looking. The people at the school were going to videotape him talking about China or something, but the video camera was having trouble. The chairman of the American Debate Team had to stand on the stage for about 20 minutes with his hands in his pockets.. so what he did while he was standing there was recite poetry…this guy recited about a million poems, such as Kipling’s The Vampire and parts of Longfellow’s The Song of Hiawatha. He was very good at it and said the poems with the right spacing so it sounded like he was speaking beautiful spells, and all the girls in the audience were falling out of their chairs on account of their hearts were exploding in love for him. So then the people at the school got the camera working and the chairman of the American Debate Team gave his lecture about China, but the whole time I was sitting there, I wasn’t thinking about China; rather, I was wondering how I could get my hands on some poetry books and start memorizing them right away, on account of how much the girls liked it when the chairman of the American Debate Team recited poems. What I really began to ponder, I suppose, was whether or not coming off as a smart guy who knows poems could be my identity, could be the thing that made me stand out in life. It’s a transparent account of a young man searching for an identity, trying to answer the question, “Who am I?” Here, Miller sought his identity in things besides God, things besides Christianity.

The (re)Born Identity of Suffering: Remembering Who You’ve Become Through Baptism (1 Pet. 3:17-4;2)

by chrisaltrock
July 21, 2009

I heard recently of a TV movie called “The Winning Season.” It tells the story of a boy whose family is going bankrupt.[1] The boy, eleven-year-old Joe, has been working for an elderly lady to earn money for his family. He’s been cleaning out Mrs. Young’s basement and throwing away old junk. In the process, Joe uncovers an old baseball card. He takes it to a card shop where he learns that the card is worth $4000. Joe hurries home and tells his parents. Their financial problems could be solved by that card. No more riding around in the broken down truck. No more working for his mother. But his Mom asks, “You got this from Mrs. Young’s garage?” “Yes,” Joe explains. His mother asks, “Joe, does Mrs. Young know? You told her, didn’t you?” “I tried, Mom, but she was asleep.” “We better call her.” “What for?” Joe asks. “You found that in her garage. It belongs to her, Joe.” Joe protests and says he found it as part of the work he was doing for Mrs. Young. It’s his. It’s theirs. It fixes their problems. But Mom stands firm. “Joe, Mrs. Young has barely two cents to her name. She needs the money, Joe.” Joe begins to realize what the right thing to do is. The right thing is to give the card back. But he and his family are going to lose a great deal by doing the right thing. Sometimes to do a good thing we have to suffer bad things.